President Obama cautioned Black Lives Matter activists against going too far, saying that attacks on police and overheated, irrational rhetoric undermine their cause.
“Whenever those of us who are concerned about failures of the criminal justice system attack police, you are doing a disservice to the cause,” Obama said in remarks to reporters in Spain, where he is traveling. “Any violence directed at police officers is a reprehensible crime and needs to be prosecuted,” he said.
Even rhetorically, if we paint police with a broad brush, or “say things that are stupid or imprudent,” it risks losing ground for the reform cause, Obama said.
“In a movement like Black Lives Matter, there are always going to be folks who say things that are stupid or imprudent or over-generalized or harsh,” Obama said. “And I don’t think that you can hold well-meaning activists who are doing the right thing, peacefully protesting, responsible for everything that is uttered at a protest site … I would just say that everybody who’s concerned about the issue of police shootings or racial bias in the criminal justice system, that maintaining a truthful and serious and respectful tone is going to help mobilize American society to bring about real change. And that is our ultimate objective.”
Obama noted police departments he said are doing the right thing, like Dallas.
But Obama also acknowledged the right to protest. “That is sometimes messy and controversial,” he said, pointing to the abolition movement and drive for women’s voting rights as examples.
And police organizations should be respectful of the frustrations that communities feel and not dismiss their concerns as political correctness, he asserted. “I’d like all sides to listen to each other,” he said.
